Executive Interview: Chris Pearson, President of 5G Americas

5G Americas, the voice of LTE and 5G in the Americas, is an industry trade organization composed of leading telecommunications service providers and manufacturers. The organization's mission is to advocate for and foster the advancement and full capabilities of LTE wireless technology and its evolution to 5G.

5G Americas is focused on three areas -- technical recommendations, regulatory policy, industry outreach and education -- across all key stakeholders. The members benefit from working together to remove technical and regulatory barriers to our great mobile wireless industry. LTE has been established as the mobile broadband foundation in the Americas region and now that we are heading toward 5G our members get a voice in this progress. North Americas is the technology market share leader with LTE mobile broadband and an overall leader in many mobile wireless metrics. 5G Americas worked to reach that leading LTE status for North America and we intend to work toward continued success with 5G.

What partner organizations do you have and what is their involvement?

5G Americas has partnerships, memberships and relationships throughout the Americas region and the world. Much of the success of 5G Americas is due to the fact that we are a cooperative and collaborative organization. As an example, we recently signed a multi-lateral 5G event Memorandum of Understanding with other global visionary 5G associations to represent the Americas region including 5G Forum (Korea), IMT-2020 (5G) Promotion Group (China), the 5G Infrastructure Association (5G-IA, Europe), Fifth Generation Mobile Communications Promotion Forum (5GMF, Japan) and Telebrasil – Projeto “5G Brasil”. There are numerous other groups throughout Latin America with which we have cooperative agreements. Also, 5G Americas has relationships and memberships of a more global nature with entities such as ITU, 3GPP, NGMN Alliance, Small Cell Forum and the GSMA.

How are you involved in industry regulatory and advocacy issues?

5G Americas has a robust regulatory and advocacy program where we communicate important technical and policy opinions through meetings, seminars, letters and government filings throughout the Americas region. Spectrum policy is a critical area for the success of mobile wireless technology and an increasingly important area of contribution for our association. As an example, 5G Americas provided several filings with the FCC on 5G mmWave spectrum. In 2016, the FCC released the rules for allocation for 28 GHz, 37 GHz and 39 GHz spectrum, the first government in the world to identify and allocate high band spectrum for mobile wireless.

You have a rich library of resources; what is offered in this area for education and support?

5G Americas has a significant library of white papers available for free download at www.5gamericas.org on topics such as 5G technical recommendations, spectrum, Internet of Things, Network Slicing, Vehicle-to-Vehicle Connectivity and the transformation of mobile wireless communications and networks for our great industry. Our papers are recognized throughout the industry as important reference information to progress the mobile wireless industry and are used by governments throughout the world. 5G Americas was one of the earliest associations to make technical and spectrum recommendations regarding 5G.

5G Americas is often involved in panels and forums, what are the major events you attend?

5G Americas speaks at various events throughout the region and the world. Jose Otero, Director of Latin America and the Caribbean for 5G Americas has extensive speaking engagements in the Latin America and Caribbean region. Specifically, I have spoken at events such as Mobile World Congress, CES, CTIA Super Mobility, 5G World, 5G North America the Global 5G Events (in Beijing, Rome and Tokyo) and many more.

Where do you see the most activity in the last 6 months for 5G?

There is a lot of activity at the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) focusing on 5G standards development. Additionally, I expect the United States and Asia-Pacific operators and their global vendor partners to lead in 5G research, development, trials and pre-commercial deployments. There have already been many announcements regarding the progress of leading operators in the U.S. on 5G trials and plans. Furthermore, the upcoming Olympic competitions in Japan and Korea are expected to highlight 5G technology.

Any parting thoughts?

The mobile wireless industry moves at a fast pace and 5G Americas progresses quickly as well. 5G Americas has helped LTE become the mobile wireless foundation for the world and in North America to secure the world’s largest market share at 67%. We began our work on 5G recommendations three years ago and in 2016 changed our name from 4G Americas to 5G Americas. Of course, we are the same and yet evolving industry association, working toward the successful evolution of wireless services for citizens, governments and industries in our region for the new, fifth generation of services that will change the way we live, work and play.

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